


Untitled (Lynchtrips)

by Hope



Category: Lord of the Rings RPF, lotrips
Genre: AU, Genderfuck, Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2003-11-17
Updated: 2003-11-17
Packaged: 2017-10-02 13:27:51
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,914
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6881
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hope/pseuds/Hope
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Inspired by the cinematography and narrative style of David Lynch.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Untitled (Lynchtrips)

**Author's Note:**

> A mathom.

1.

The light wavers uncertainly with the heat rising from the desert and the bitumen; the city growing up just before the horizon, black and oily and metamorphic and more dominant than the decomposing sun. The gas fumes unfurl languidly into Dom's senses and he leans heavily on the pump, letting his hips tilt, his knees unlock and the sun-scorched skin on the back of his neck pull tight as his head drops forward and 2000 miles of road rushes to catch up with him, spilling like ribbon into his skull.

"I'm going to the bathroom." Dom looks up, blinking dazedly after the swinging denim, headrest-tousled hair. The pump in his hand rattles and clunks to a halt.

*

The bills are soft and damp from the pocket pressed into the crease of his thigh, and Dom unpeels an extra few in exchange for a wax-red soft-wrapped box of cigarettes, the memory of spoken words wreathed in grey smoke. He slides back into the car and she's sitting on the other side of the bench seat, elbow resting on the open window sill, fingers toying idly with the hair above her ear. Dom can see the pink sunburn crowning her cheekbones, eyes lazy and half lidded as they regard him with mild interest; his heart's pounding after watching, for what seems like forever, the red and over-exposed white of headlights play over the line of her jaw, her head tilted away from him, rough road vibration beneath them.

Dom tosses the cigarettes into her lap; her eyes drop, lazy blue, and she takes the pack in her free hand, starts to play with it with an idleness that's reflected in her languid pose; tapping it languorously against her thigh, letting it slide through her loosely curled fist. Dom twists the key in the ignition, guns the engine, the tires squealing their enthusiasm as Dom flips his sunglasses down again to face the sun.

*

Neon ghosts linger in Dom's eyes and his feet are unsteady after his body's stillness and the car's movement. She seems to come alive with the lights, red and blue curving around the lines of her face and seeming to stay as if painted on even in the artificial light of the hotel room. Blackout curtains lend to the faded room a sense of timelessness, disorientation, and Dom drops his suitcase on the single bald armchair before pushing through the door into the bathroom. His head doesn't fit under the inadequate curve of the tap so he bows his neck and ineffectually palms the cool stream of water over the back of his head, feeling it tingle through the sweat- and wind-stiff hair. His reflection is blurred when he straightens suddenly again, and he shudders as rivulets of water, already warming against his skin, trickle down beneath his collar. He shakes away the dizziness, leans forward; in the cheap fluorescent light it looks like he's been punched but the whiteness and dark contrast dissipates as he steps away from the mirror again.

She's already changed when Dom steps out of the closet-bathroom; pale in a white slip, legs crossed under her as she sits on the end of the single bed.

"I'm taking the bed," she says, and Dom nods tiredly, unbuttoning shirt and unbuckling belt, folding his own legs into the sunken seat of the armchair.

*

The blackout curtains stay closed. Dom flicks through the bland pay-per-view screens to free-to-air daytime television, then finally stabs it off in frustration as another newscaster interrupts the broadcast. She lounges on the bed, knees bent and feet swaying slightly in the air, cheek resting on her folded arms. Dom stands, steps closer, paces. She looks up at him with amused curiosity.

"Maybe we... Maybe we should--" Dom edges around the bed and parts the curtains with his fingertips, peering out, brows jutting low and protective over his eyes. "Shit. How did it get so late so quick?"

He steps back again and the stiffness of the fabric holds the curtain open in a slight gaping fold; she rolls over and sits up, the light making her white t-shirt red, breasts casting burgundy shadows.

Low dip of her lashes. "Take me out."

"Where to? I thought you wanted to--"

She shrugs, swings her legs out to hang over the side of the bed. Her short hair looks like it's been caught in the act of struggling to escape, a situation not settled in the least by her pulling her t-shirt up over her head, leaning across the bed and digging in her bag. "A club, a casino. A show. What are we here for, anyway?" She smiles over her shoulder at him.

"Okay. Okay. Baby--" He reaches out, his palm itching for the mobile curve of her bare shoulder blade, and she looks back at him from the door of the bathroom.

"Fifteen minutes." She smiles again. "Put on a tie or something! At least a shirt."

"Okay." He stumbles around the bed again and jerks the curtain shut.

*

She moves like dark sound between the muffled tinny jingles of the machines; blue velvet dress and red light interwoven with her hair as she walks in front of him. Dom follows with the sharp-crack-rattling of coins dropping as if directly into his skull. He buys her a drink and they sit at a small, sticky-topped table; he watches her sip as she watches the tight dresses business suits despair drift around them like orbiting planets. There is a constant subterranean growl: the light shows further back in the catacombs of the casino, heavy sound punctuated by sporadic squeals of feedback.

There's music playing somewhere too, and Dom thinks he sees her lips curling around the low, smoky voice, but the movement is muffled like the sound as his vision stutters blurrily, and she leans forward with the heel of her palm braced against the green felt and polished wood edge of the long table, head tilted slightly away from him and her skin so white in contrast to the plastic red and blue chips stacked on the table. Dom brings his fist, pregnant with greasy dice, up towards his face.

"Kiss me," he murmurs, poised to bowl them onto the table but eyes fixed on hers, his body tilting closer. "For luck."

 

*

 

1.

The city crouches on the horizon like a spider, belly low and swollen, poisonous, with spines of red and blue light rising from it as they get closer. The wind blowing in their faces is now tinged with more than the itch of hot sand; it's thick and oily with petrol fumes, fried food, dirty money. Dom waits in the car in the front yard of the greasy gas station, poised between the desert and the city, and buries his face in the crevasse between the headrest and the seat to inhale lingering scents of sweat and clove cigarettes; both are overpowered with the strong smell of leather, wet and coppery.

She makes him wait while she lights up, pink lips tensed around the column of the cigarette, and when he sees the eager flare of the cherry he guns the engine, speeds out onto the highway again. It's still in the car, save for the leisurely rise and fall of her hand as she drags on the cigarette, her head leaning back, face tilted and jaw angled away, and Dom's head turning from the road to her to the road again.

*

The hotel room faces the desert and the sunset; the air inside is thick with amniotic dust and red light oozing around the heavy folds of the blackout curtains. Dom can barely breathe in it, let alone see, and he stands in front of the rust-spotted bathroom mirror for countless minutes, watching the cold water drip over his motionless face, cadaver-like in the flickering fluorescent light.

When he emerges, the only part of her left visible is her unruly hair, the light making the heavy blankets look like flesh. It's unbearably hot; Dom strips off his shirt with aching shoulders, back protesting as he shoves his jeans down past his knees and drops into the single bald armchair to sleep.

*

Dom blinks as she interrupts another newsflash, flickers of red between her white thighs as she stands in front of the television. He drags his eyes up to her face, pushes himself up and towards her, and she swings her legs around and off the edge of the bed to sit up. She doesn't look half as tired as Dom feels, drugged by the heaviness of the room. His hands are numb as he rubs them over his face, leans against the window frame and pulls the curtain open slightly to peer out. Her voice is low, as if she's standing directly behind him. "Take me out."

*

The lights from the stage cast her face blood-red, lashes fanning down creating black voids in place of eyes. The image shifts and blurs as the chunky, sharp-edged static sound from the speakers raises pitch, drowning out the smoky voice of the lone singer. Her lower lip cradles the edge of her glass; Dom watches her throat move as she tips her head back and swallows. Dom leans forward as her tongue languorously dips out to retrieve stray drops from the corner of her mouth. The line of her shoulders is fluid beneath the straps of the blue velvet dress, spine dipping beneath, and she turns back to him as he gathers up the dice. The green felt is almost abrasive against his knuckles. His hand is shaking; her lips curl up in a slow smile and the pistol digs into his hip, muzzle pointing down to the apex of his thighs. "Kiss me," he murmurs, his hands hot and sticky. "For luck."

*

0.

The city hovers like a second sun on the horizon, blacker and hotter than the bitumen racing away beneath the wheels. Neither grow any larger nor shrink as Dom's foot aches on the gas pedal. Sweat worms beneath his collar at the back of his neck but he can't turn his head for the hot harsh sound in the car, scraping claws along the inside curve of his skull, buzzing red at the corners of his vision. A deadening tiredness threatens to overtake him, and he opens his eyes to the same violent red soaking up from the deceptive flatness of the desert horizon, hands glued to the steering wheel, his vision lurching with motion despite the car being still, heavy black amidst the desolation.

Dom turns his head sluggishly, as if the stench weighs heavily in the air, but the face is turned away, jaw tilted up, white and red and not-blue on the opposite side of the bench seat. The muzzle of the pistol is hot in the crease of Dom's thigh and it takes a timeless moment for him to free it from his waistband with numb hands. The growing sound and vibration in the car confuses his sense-memory, silken grey smoke and wet, sticky heat; squeal of feedback sharp crack of coins dropping into slots; recoil into his palm and aching shoulders five, six times?

The skin against Dom's hand is cold in the fiery interior of the car, his jaw fits perfectly into Dom's palm as he turns the head to face him, metal hot and real against his temple. "Kiss me," he murmurs, leaning forward, his finger sticky on the trigger. "For luck."

**Author's Note:**

> http://hopeful-fiction.livejournal.com/15305.html


End file.
